Five Years

It's hard to believe that it's been five years since 9/11/01. So much has happened since then.

I spent the days prior to 9/11/01 around the World Trade Center towers. I took some friends for sightseeing in Chinatown and Soho. I remember crossing lower Broadway at around 6:00PM and seeing the sun shining off the sides of the towers. The next day we nursed hangovers in the grass under a shade tree in Pattery Park. The towers were about a hundred yards behind us.

On the morning of 9/10/01 I caught a flight from La Guardia airport to Houston. We took the usual route heading straight south following the East River before heading southwest. Oh what a site the city is from the air on a clear sunny morning. I saw the Twin Towers in all their glory rising from the age old streets of Lower Manhattan. As always I was mesmerized. I would never see them again.

I was always mesmerized by the sight of those towers. How could I not be? I took a trip to the top with my Mom and brothers right when they opened the observation deck. We could see them from our neighborood in Queens. The tips could be seen from the ball fields at Juniper Park. Those towers could be seen from almost anywhere, at least that's what it seemed like to me.

We partied there in 1999 at the Anderson Consulting New York City formal event. Cocktails at Windows on the World. Party at the World Financial Center. And after hours at the Top of The World bar near the top of one of the towers. They had to throw us out at 2AM because the Port Authority was shutting the elevators down. I spent that night at the Millenium Hilton right across the street with a view of the plaza between the two buildings.

There are more stories. Maybe I'll tell you someday. Now the towers are gone and only many memories remain.

And the people. Yes the people. I think my Mom summed it up on the morning of 9/11/01 when she commented to me on the phone in exasperation, "All those people." Indeed. We will miss them dearly.

This morning I boarded a plane once again bound for Houston. Five years and a day after that other flight to Houston. The Continental Airlines flight took off and headed east before banking hard north. It was all there once again. New York Harbor. The Statue of Liberty. Lower Manhattan with a hole in the skyline. And then the rest of the city. As we banked hard left to turn south I caught the Weehawken reservoir out of the corner of my eye and thought about Juliet and Mia.

We're all lucky to have this time. I will not forget.